274 posts categorized "Hotels and lodging"

July 22, 2015

Don't expect to book a room in Rochester's downtown Holiday Inn after Aug 31, according to the hotel chain's national reservation line.

An InterContinental Hotels representative on the reservation line said this week that Rochester employees said the 170-room hotel at 220 Broadway Ave. S will close at the end of August. They told the ICH representative the closing is because of the sale of the hotel.

For several months, word has been leaking out about a deal to sell the downtown hotel to an unnamed buyer who is planning to convert the 46-year-old hotel into a senior living facility.

If the buzz is correct, these talks have been going on for quite a while without reaching closure. Now the employees are saying a closure is on the way.

July 17, 2015

Construction on a 23-story downtown Rochester tower has yet to begin because the developer has not finalized financing for the project, according to a city official.

In May, the City of Rochester pledged $6.5 million in assistance to developer Gus Chafoulias to build his long-planned $140 million Broadway at Center tower. Chafoulias, with limited assistance from his son Andrew Chafoulias and Titan Development and Investments, has been working on different versions of this project since 2007.

Broadway at Center will house a 264-room Hilton Hotel, 33 apartment units and space for office, retail and restaurant use. More than $14 million — including the city's $6.5 million assistance to the developer and the remainder of infrastructure costs — is planned to be reported as Destination Medical Center local contributions and credited toward the city's $128 million commitment.

The tower is to be built on South Broadway and East Center Street, just north of Broadway Residence and Suites by BridgeStreet. Since early last year, buildings that previously housed CJ's Midtown Lounge, Ginny's Fine Fabrics and Jakobson Management Co. have sat empty on the site. When the tenants were asked to vacate, Titan officials estimated that the buildings would be demolished during the summer of 2014.

When approving the project, the city agreed to work in conjunction with the developers to build an attached public parking ramp. But city officials said they have to wait on final paperwork from Titan Development before construction can start.

"Chafoulias indicated a while back that they are still reviewing some of their financing options for the project, so they have not provided us with that signed development agreement as of yet. I'm anticipating it should be fairly soon," City Redevelopment Director Terry Spaeth said. "I know they are looking at a couple different financing options."

The development agreement includes a number of provisions about vacating an alley, conveying properties and approving easements.

Spaeth said it's estimated it will take 22 months, from start to finish, to build Broadway at Center. The city's portion of the project is expected to take nine to 12 months to complete. The plan is for the city work to be completed to coincide with the opening of the overall project.

"Once they get going, I suspect things will get moving pretty rapidly," he said. "The first step is to get the development assistance agreement signed."

When asked about the status of the Broadway at Center project, Titan Marketing and Communications Manager Sheila Thoma said there wasn't much to report.

"I do not have a new/significant update. The project is still on course. With a major project like this, there are a lot of moving parts and it takes time to solidify all details," she wrote in response to inquiries about when the CJ's and Ginny's Fine Fabrics buildings would be demolished.

On May 4, the city approved a development assistance agreement with Titan about Broadway at Center. The Rochester Economic Development Authority, a board comprised of the seven Rochester City Council members, approved $6.5 million in tax increment financing and land write-downs. The EDA had put its development assistance agreement on hold until the Destination Medical Center Corp. board of directors named Broadway at Center as a DMC project. That happened on April 30.

Broadway at Center is reminiscent of a previous project called Time Square that Gus Chafoulias proposed for that block 15 years ago. When Mayo Clinic opted not to lease office space in the $200 million project, Chafoulias withdrew it in 2000.

"This is the single biggest disappointment of my career," Chafoulias said after making the announcement. "It never feels good when you fail. It didn't work out, but it's not the end of the world."

After Chafoulias withdrew, Dubai-based investors stepped in and built a 26-story tower, the tallest building in Rochester, on that corner. That tower, now known as Broadway Residence and Suites, stands next door to the proposed Broadway at Center project.

The site is near Saint Marys Hospital and the Miracle Mile Shopping Center as well as many restaurants.The four-story Fairfield Inn also will be very visible to the 70,000 to 80,000 vehicles that drive by daily on U.S. 52.

May 01, 2015

Talks between the Kahler Hotel Group and the union representing most of its employees are at an impasse over health-care benefits and wages.

KHG, which includes four downtown Rochester hotels and the Textile Care Services commercial laundry, has been talking with Unite Here Local 21 since the start of the year. Local 21 represents about 480 KHG employees, including about 250 at the hotels and 200 at TCS.

Due to a April 14 ruling by the National Labor Relations Board, the hotels and commercial laundry no longer will negotiate as one bargaining unit. That means each will have a separate contract, though the union says the details of the proposed contract and points of contention are very similar for both groups.

The latest contract, which was a six-month extension of a previous three-year contract, ended at the start of March. Since then, the hotels' housekeepers, bartenders, cooks and bellmen, as well as the laundry employees, have been working without a contract.

Local 21 President Brian Brandt and a team of employee representatives met with KHG and Richfield Hospitality executives on Tuesday to discuss the proposed five-year contract. Both sides say no progress was made nor was another meeting scheduled.

"The negotiations broke down very quickly," said Brandt. "They aren't budging even a little bit. They rejected our proposal outright without discussion or explanation of why."

Brandt said Tuesday's talks lasted about a half hour. Patrick Short, area managing director of operations for Kahler, said "several items" were covered at the meeting.

"At this time, we are not against an additional meeting, but no date has been chosen. We currently are standing by our last proposal offered on March 24," stated Short in an email Tuesday afternoon. The two sides last met on April 16.

Short released a broad outline of KHG's contract proposal with a statement last week.

"In our last best and final offer, we believe we have offered a very competitive package which continues to contain the best package for hospitality workers in the entire city of Rochester," he wrote in an email sent late Thursday afternoon.

Short says KHG is paying for up to 70 percent of the premium costs for the insurance provided to the union associates.

But Brandt responded that the deductibles are too high — more than $4,300 for single and more than $8,500 for plus one and family coverage and no copay on the prescription medications.

On wages, Short said KHG's offer would give 88 percent of the union associates an increase in their hourly rate of pay at the signing of the contract.

The union says while most would get a pay increase, the majority of employees would receive less than 1 percent on signing and less than 5 percent over the next five years. In addition, the offer reduces the step increases at 24, 42 and 60 months.

On the point of wages, Short said the KHG contract offer "does not reduce the hourly rate of pay for any of the union associates, regardless if the associate has been here a year or 30 years."

The union says one group of employees — banquet servers — will see a reduction of income under the KHG contract offer. They no longer will receive any of the service charge the company adds on to customers' bill, which will result in a 50 percent or more pay loss for the servers.

Following Tuesday's meeting, Brandt said Local 21 intends to file a number of charges against KHG of possible violations of federal law with the National Labor Relations Board. The charges include surface bargaining, bad faith bargaining, failing to provide accurate information for negotiations, discriminating against bargaining committee members concerning discipline and job assignments, telling probationary workers to remove union buttons and change in working conditions by removing union notices from bulletin boards.

The question facing both groups now is what comes next in the negotiations.

"We'll definitely be taking more actions and doing the things we need to do to pressure on the company," said Brandt.

Those immediate actions will include more picket lines in front of the Kahler hotels. When asked if those actions could include some sort of strike or work stoppage, he responded, "It's is always an option, without a doubt."

The seller, Rochester's Titan Development & Investments, said it will remain partially invested as a partner in the 16-year-old hotel. However, Titan no longer will be involved in the management of the 72-room hotel.

Financial details of the sale were not released by Titan.

Titan CEO Andy Chafoulias originally built the hotel in 2001 and opened it under the Sleep Inn & Suites brand. The hotel is built on land Chafoulias leased from the city of Rochester.

In 2010, the hotel parted ways with the Sleep Inn name and temporarily became the independent Airport Event Center Hotel.

The hotel joined the AmericInn brand in 2010. While Chafoulias remained an owner, Joe Powers, of the nearby Rochester International Events Center and Ground Round restaurant, and well-known Rochester hotelier Myron Salz, of the Centerstone Plaza Hotel, stepped in as managing investors to run the hotel operations. It employed a staff of about 17 at the time.

Chafoulias said in Thursday's announcement of the sale that selling to the Turners was a good opportunity for Titan, which is busy with many other developments, such as the recently completed H3 Plaza tower in downtown Rochester.

“With the numerous focuses that we have around Rochester and across the country, we felt that it was a good time to sell the AmericInn," Chafoulias stated in the news release. "It’s a great hotel with consistently solid numbers, and we foresee a very successful future for it.”

The new owners have "immediate plans of enhancing the hotel’s exterior and interior," according to Titan.

January 20, 2015

That changed last week, when Pat Blum retired after 36 years as an administrator, and the family sold the nursing home at 1875 19th St. NW for $3.5 million. Pritok Capital of Skokie, Ill., purchased Maple Manor. Pritok now owns seven small senior facilities across the country, including one in St. Cloud.

"It's time to step aside, but it's a sad goodbye," said Blum. "I have mixed feelings obviously. You're talking about moving on from something that has really defined me for 50-plus years of my life."

It all started when Pat's parents, David and Dorothy Blum, with the help of their six sons, began managing the facility on the first day its doors opened. In fact, the whole family lived and worked there for a year as it was getting going.

"It was all hands on deck back then," said Pat Blum, laughing as he remembered telling school friends that he lived in a nursing home. "Nursing homes used have a lot more families involved in running them."

After he graduated from college and earned his administrator's license, Pat began working at Maple Manor in 1978. His parents retired in 1981.

A new administrator, Karl Swedberg, took the reins last week. He has known the Blums professionally for 17 years and is familiar with Maple Manor.

"We're really excited to be in Rochester. I don't expect any big changes immediately for residents or the staff," Swedberg said.

Maple Manor has more than 100 full-time and part-time employees on staff.

"This is a good match for us. They really 'get' it," Blum said of Pritok.

Pritok is coming into the Rochester market during a senior living building boom, with several new facilities, such as River Bend Assisted Living and The Waters on Mayowood, opening and almost all of the existing ones in the area expanding. Being near Mayo Clinic makes Rochester very attractive to the more than 77 million baby boomers, born between 1946 and 1964.

While the Blums are no longer involved with Maple Manor, that doesn't mean they are done with senior care. In 1981, the Blum brothers realized when residents were discharged, "They weren't getting enough support," Pat said. That drove them to start Comfort Health, one of the first home health-care programs in the area.

The family still owns Meadow Lakes Senior Living in Rochester and Prairie Meadows Senior Living in Kasson. Pat still has responsibilities at Comfort Health, which is run by his brother, Chris Blum. Another brother, Pete Blum, still handles the finances of Meadow Lakes and Prairie Meadows.

"I'm still working toward being totally retired," Pat said. "The irony is that my wife just recently graduated as a nurse."

January 07, 2015

TPI Hospitality, which has three hotels and about 125 employees in Rochester, transitioned from the family-owned company to an employee-owned one at the start of 2015.

The Willmar-based firm owns the recently opened Homewood Suites, SpringHill Suites by Marriott and Courtyard by Marriott featuring the Saints on Second restaurant in Rochester. All of them are located near Mayo Clinic's St. Marys Hospital on Second Street Southwest.

It also owns Days Inn, Holiday Inn Conference Center and Perkins Restaurant in Austin. TPI also owns a Perkins Restaurant in Red Wing.

Overall, TPI owns and operates 31 hotel properties and nine restaurants. It has six more hotels under construction. All of its properties are in Minnesota, except a Staybridge Suites hotel in Naples, Fla.

TPI Hospitality has been owned by the Torgerson family since it was founded as a retail business in 1930. In September, CEO Tom Torgerson surprised his employees by announcing he planned to transition ownership through an employee stock ownership plan.

“I chose an ESOP to reward employees for their past, current and future diligent service to TPI, to preserve the legacy of our work and position TPI for the next 50 years and beyond," he saidin a release. "The transition to 100 percent employee ownership not only helps to secure the future of TPI Hospitality as a locally owned and operated company but it also allows us to reward our almost 1,800 employees, many of whom have been with the company for over 20 years, with a superior retirement benefit”.

TPI says it is now one of the largest employee-owned hospitality companies in the country and it is on track to grow to become the largest.

“Becoming an ESOP will require a change in perspective by everyone. I envision an environment where every employee acts as an owner without regard for their specific role within the company. Just imagine the impact of having 1800 owners approaching their jobs the same way,” said Chief Operating Officer Mitch Peterson.